Curlylocks' New Bed
by Angela3
Summary: A brief ficlet taking place soon after the events of The Hunting Party. KateSawyer. A little sweet but hopefully not too sappy. Kate doesn't want to spend the night alone...
1. Chapter 1

"Well, well, well," said Sawyer, throwing down his bag as he entered the tent that served as his makeshift home. "Looks like Curlylocks found herself a new bed."

Kate stirred from her slumber on the padded sleeping bag he'd recently acquired in a bet, and looked up at him through eyes still clouded with sleep. She yawned groggily and sat up.

"It's 'just right,' ain't it, Freckles?" he asked playfully.

She granted him a small smile. "It'll do," she said.

"Now are you gonna tell me what exactly you're doin' in my bed?"

"I _was _sleeping," she said, half irritated, half amused.

"I can see that," he smirked. "But if I'm not mistaken, you've got a little pad of your own. So what brings you to mine?"

Kate stood and moved to exit the tent. "No reason," she said as casually as she could manage. "I'll go if you don't want me to be here."

"Now, now, Freckles, don't let's get ahead of ourselves here," he said, stopping her with a firm hand on her arm. "Papa Bear don't come home to find a pretty girl in his bed and let her off that easy."

"Let me go, Sawyer," she said.

"Not till I get some answers," he insisted.

Kate sighed and looked down at the sand. "Truth?" she said softly. There was a beat. "I didn't want to be alone tonight."

"Ahh," said Sawyer with a small nod. "Lookin' for a warm body, are you?"

"It's not like that, Sawyer, and you know it," she said angrily, and moved to exit the tent once more.

But he stopped her again. "Tell me what it is like," he said, and his voice had a seriousness and a gentleness in it that was lacking before.

She looked up at him and in the dim light he thought he saw a glimmer in her eyes that might be tears. "I can't," she said softly, the edge of a sob hiding just under the surface of her voice.

There was a long beat in which neither of them said anything and Sawyer only stood looking at her face. Finally, he exhaled and shaking his head said quietly, "Alright. You can stay."

She looked up at him, a bit surprised, and then asked, "Where are you going to sleep?"

Sawyer laughed, relieved to slide back into the easier territory of banter. "What d'ya mean, where am I gonna sleep? There's room enough for two." The naughty grin was back on his face.

Kate eyed the sleeping bag suspiciously. It was clearly only intended for one. "I don't think so," she said with a little chuckle.

"Well, maybe you're right," he said devilishly, "but lucky for you I don't mind gettin' cozy."

Pulling his shirt off over his head by the neck, he threw it into a corner of the tent and gestured towards the sleeping bag. "Ladies first," he said with a grin.

Feeling slightly self-conscious as he watched her, Kate snuggled into the bag and tried to appear nonchalant. This was not exactly what she'd had in mind when she'd set out for Sawyer's tent, although her game plan had never been very clear. She'd only known she didn't want to be alone tonight – not after what had happened.

Sawyer laughed as he moved in next to her. "Are those your PJ's, Freckles?" he asked, referring to the jeans and tank top she was still wearing. "I'd have guessed you to be the type that sleeps in the nude." His voice had the familiar teasing edge she'd grown so used to.

Kate scoffed. "You wish."

"You have no idea what I wish, Sweetheart," he said, and the teasing tone in his voice could not mask the very serious look in his eyes.

Feeling suddenly flushed and very, very much too close to him, Kate rolled her eyes and pretended to be offended, turning away from him so that her back faced him. "Aw, where you goin'?" he asked. "Don't like pillow talk?"

"Shut up, Sawyer," she said.

"Not a very nice thing to say to a man who's letting your share his bed," he said silkily, scooting in closer behind her until their bodies were flush together.

Kate said nothing but felt her breathing speed up a notch and prayed he didn't notice.

"Ain't you even gonna say goodnight?" he asked quietly, his breath warm on her bare shoulder. She could swear his lips were only millimeters away from her skin.

There was a long moment before she spoke. "I was really scared tonight," she said, so softly he could barely hear her. He did not have to ask what she was referring to – the incident only hours before of her being held hostage by the man who had shot him was still fresh in his mind.

"Yeah," he said after a moment, just as softly. "Me too."

Somewhere in the dark his hand found hers and covered it, warm and large and strong. And as the sound of the ocean lulled her into much needed rest, she thought she felt the feather-light brush of what might have been a kiss on her shoulder.


	2. Chapter 2

The early light of dawn was just creeping into the tent when Kate awoke and remembered where she was. Sawyer lay asleep at her side, one arm draped casually across her torso. His steady breathing reassured her that he was still asleep, and moving very slowly, she tried to slip out from under his arm.

He stirred at her movement but did not wake, instead tightening his hold across her body. _Instinct, _she thought. _It's nothing personal. He sleeps with a lot of valuable stuff around and he doesn't want anyone taking it, that's all. He probably thinks I'm a suitcase or something._

She waited a moment before attempting to move again, and again was stopped. Now he pulled her solidly against his body, and if the hardness she felt pressing against her bottom was any indication, he had _not _mistaken her for a suitcase, after all. The instinct to flee became severe. Any moment and things might escalate beyond even this.

"Mmmm," he moaned into her hair, a little unconscious noise of sleep that sent her almost to the point of franticness to extract herself. Taking his arm, she forcibly flung it off of her, and sitting up, reached for her boots hastily and began pulling them on as quickly as she could.

The movement of his arm had woken him, and Sawyer propped himself up on his elbows and grinned at her suggestively. "Mornin', Sunshine," he said silkily, with the knowing smirk usually only favored by one addressing a lover after a night of sex.

"Hey," she said with a glance across her shoulder at him and a small smile, fumbling with the laces on her shoes quickly. She was half standing and close to escape when Sawyer grabbed her arm and with a hard jerk that knocked her off balance, brought her tumbling down on top of him.

"_Ooompfff," _he grunted involuntarily from the impact of her hitting his chest and bad shoulder, but there was a smile on his face, as if he had almost enjoyed it. "Where you headed in such a hurry?" he asked slyly, his eyes still sleepy but with a mischievous glint in them. "Thought you'd want breakfast in bed."

"I have to pee," she lied, heart racing.

"Liar," he said, but he was smiling. "You're just trying to slip out unseen, ain't you?"

"Let me go," she said, struggling against him and succeeding only in grinding her hips into the hard bulge in his jeans. He inhaled sharply, his eyes drifting closed in pleasure for a moment. When he opened them again he smirked at her shamelessly.

"You feel that, Freckles?" he asked her. Her eyes looked huge and alarmed. "Yeah, I thought so," he said when she didn't answer, chuckling a little. "You really gonna leave a man in that condition?" He cocked an eyebrow at her, his question both a challenge and an invitation.

"You're disgusting," she said, trying to give her voice an edge of toughness.

"Oh I am, am I?" he asked mockingly. "I guess that's why you're always checking me out then, huh?"

"I do _not _check you out." She pulled away from him and he let her go.

"Liar, liar, pants on fire," he teased as she grabbed for her backpack desperately, ready to run. She was just pushing aside the flap of the tent when he stood suddenly and blocked her exit. "Uh uh uh," he clucked, shaking his head. "Not just yet, Peaches. I know you ain't in such an all-fired hurry to get outta hear because you've gotta pee. You're just in a rush because you don't want everybody and his brother to see you crawling out of my tent in the wee morning hours and have them sayin' to themselves, '_Well golly damn, I wonder what _they _were up to.' _All you gotta do is admit it and you're free to go."

"That's not it," she insisted, trying to push past him. "I don't care what anyone thinks."

"We both know _that's _a lie," he said, smirking, halting her with one strong hand on her shoulder. He looked down at her with a smirk. "I just don't see what the big deal is, really... hell, they all know about us, anyway."

Kate shook her head, eyebrows knitted together in feigned confusion. "What are you talking about, Sawyer? There is no '_us.'_"

"Don't play dumb with me, Freckles," he said, teasing gone. "Anyone with half a brain out there knows there's something going on between you and me, and so do you."

"I'm leaving," she said brusquely, pushing past him and out of the tent. She tried to act nonchalant as she spotted Hurley and Charlie in the surf, fishing, and wondered if they had seen her leaving Sawyer's tent.

"Bathroom's that-a-way, Sweet Cheeks," he called after her, pointing towards the jungle, the opposite direction of where she was heading.

She ignored him and continued walking, and as he disappeared back inside his tent with a frustrated laugh, a glint of red fabric caught his eye.

"Hey, Kate!" he yelled, emerging from his tent again and drawing the attention of several people beginning their morning routines on the beach. "You forgot something!" And before she had time to react, he had thrown her a bright red bra that she caught on instinct.

Recognizing it as her own and fumbling to stuff it in her pocket before anyone saw what it was, she furiously stormed back into the tent.

"_You've been going through my stuff!_" she asked incredulously, holding the bra in a clenched fist. "Stealing my _underwear? _What kind of a pervert are you?"

"A pervert that wants any little piece of you he can get," said Sawyer, his hands held out and open away from his body in a gesture of honest confession. "But I can't take credit for stealing that, although I can't say I'd mind that kind of souvenir," he said with a smile, pointing at the bra. "It must've fallen out of your bag when you were zipping it up just now. That's what you get for being in such a hurry, now isn't it, Smary Pants?"

Unsure of what else to do and still feeling violently angry and unsettled by how well he read her and how right he always was about these things, Kate slapped him hard across the face. He looked surprised and reached a hand up to his stinging cheek, licking his lips and chuckling bitterly. "Is that how you wanna play, Kate?" he asked softly through narrowed eyes as she stood there in front of him, surprised at her own actions. "That's how you want it to be? Well," he laughed humorlessly, "I should've guessed you'd like it rough."

And before she saw it coming he was kissing her, not slow and gentle like before but angrily, roughly, hard, lips bruising and pulling at hers fiercely. "Is that how you like it?" he demanded as he broke away from her briefly, his fingers tangling in her curly hair and pulling just hard enough to sting her scalp, a hand on her waist gripping just tight enough to cause discomfort. "Is it?" His eyes were demanding and angry.

"Let me go or I'll scream," she said angrily, her face defiant.

"_Good,_" he sneered, his eyes hard and unforgiving, "let the whole damn camp hear and come running to see what we're doing. Reckon what they'll think when they see you in here like this? Ain't that the exact thing you were trying to avoid? Hell, I'd kinda hoped you'd be a screamer, anyway." He kissed her again, still roughly, and as she opened her mouth in protest and surprise it only served to let his tongue slip in, warm and wet. She struggled to pull away from him out of habit before finally ceasing her efforts and allowing herself to melt languidly into him, realizing the futility in trying to overpower him and finding herself lacking any real inspiration to break away from his lips that were becoming gradually more kind, moving from hard, angry kisses to softer, open-mouthed ones, not quite wanting to part from the warm hand that was no longer bruising but had slid under the hem of her shirt with rough fingertips grazing the sensitive skin of the small of her back. Finally they separated and they were both breathing heavily, Kate looking down, too afraid of what she might see in his gaze or what he might see in hers to meet his eyes.

"How long are you gonna keep fightin' this, Kate?" he asked softly.

"I don't know what you mean," she said, still avoiding eye contact.

"You know _exactly _what I mean," he said, taking her face in his hand and forcing her to look at him. "But you're always either pretendin' like it ain't there, or runnin' from it like a scared rabbit."

Kate looked simultaneously defiant and guilty, her jaw set but her eyes sad. She sighed and pulled away from his arms, turning away from him and brushing the hair out of her face with the back of her hand. There was a long moment before she spoke. "Okay, fine," she said reluctantly after a moment, turning back to him and throwing her hands up in exasperation. "So yeah, I'm – I'm attracted to you." She was tripping over her words as she spoke, uncomfortable with these kinds of admissions. "Maybe... maybe I even have feelings for you. But it – it doesn't _mean _anything, Sawyer."

"It means _everything,_" he said gruffly, his voice low and serious and his eyes intense.

"It's just lust, Sawyer," she said quietly, wanting to explain it away with the easy answer but not quite convincing even herself. "It can't last."

He shook his head and said gravely, "It ain't just lust and you know it, Kate. But then, I never met anyone in my life that hates honesty more than you do." The look in his eyes was hard and accusing, his jaw squared with determination. Grabbing her backpack off the ground where she'd dropped it when she stormed back in, he shoved it into her chest roughly and gave her a small push out of his tent. Lowering his voice and speaking into her ear, he said, "You come back when you're ready for the truth."

Kate looked back mournfully at his tent as she walked away, but he had already closed the flap behind her. The image of the blue tarp blurred with the mist of tears gathering in her eyes. Hastily, she wipe the moisture away, and shouldering her pack headed off into the jungle.


	3. Chapter 3

1"Kate," said Jack, approaching her where she sat by her tent. "We need to talk."

"Do we?" she asked, lifting an eyebrow. "Because the last time I said that to you, you walked away from me." Her voice was quiet but bitter with the memory.

"That was different," he said, grim-faced. _Different only because you have double-standards for yourself, _she thought, but said nothing.

Instead, she sighed and put aside the torn shirt she'd been patching. "Okay," she said, crossing her arms over her chest and looking up at him half-annoyed, half-expectant. "What's up?"

"Hurley told me he saw you leaving Sawyer's tent at dawn this morning."

Kate laughed humorlessly. "Wait – _that's _what this is about?"

"Yeah, that's what this is about," said Jack, nodding seriously. His hands were planted firmly on his hips and he was frowning at her. There was a beat, and then he continued with knitted eyebrows and accusation in his tone. "Are you having _sex _with him, Kate?"

Kate shook her head, disbelieving, and laughed. "That is _none _of your business, Jack," she said. "I can't believe you really came here to ask me that."

"I think it _is_ my business, Kate," he insisted. "I'm _looking out _for you. Do you really think you can _trust _him? And besides – he's slept with _prostitutes, _Kate. You could get any number of STDs from him, and we don't exactly have herpes cream lying around for when that happens. Or worse – you could get pregnant. Have you thought about that, Kate? You were there with Claire when she had her baby here. Did that look like fun to you? No medicines...? No anesthesia...? Are those really things you're willing to risk just because you've got an itch that needs scratching?"

"I cannot believe that you would say something like that to me," she said with quiet anger in her voice, clenching her jaw and speaking through gritted teeth. "I do _not_ have any _itches _that – ."

"Oh, sure," said Jack, his voice full of sarcasm. "You're hanging out with him for the conversation, right?"

"He _cares _about me, Jack!"

"No, _I _care about you, Kate."

"Oh yeah?" she asked incredulously, standing up. "Is that why you just stood there and _let a man hold a gun to my head?_" Her voice was simultaneously accusing and wounded with the memory. "Is that why you _ignored _me when I tried to apologize for _making a mistake_? Is that why you've refused to _speak _to me until you felt threatened over some dumb jealousy issue with Sawyer? Is that why you're standing here calling me a whore just because it's _him _instead of _you_? Because you '_care_' about me?"

"He's going to hurt you, Kate, one way or another," said Jack emphatically, shaking his head in disgust and turning and walking away from her. "Just don't come crying to me when he does."

Kate clenched her fist as he walked away and picked up the shirt again angrily, stabbing at it with her needle and wishing that it was Jack instead of cotton.

------

Night came quickly after hours spent taking out her physical aggression chopping wood and mashing up fruit. She had thought all day about what Jack had said to her and what she had said to him, and the words she'd spoken were ringing in her head: "He _cares _about me, Jack." She had said it without thinking, on instinct – and as if for the first time, she recognized the real truth in them.

Jack had accused her of spending time with Sawyer simply because of something physical between them, and she could not help but remember making the same argument herself only hours before. "It's just lust," she'd told Sawyer. She felt the sting of that comment now for herself.

It wasn't just lust. Jack might think that, and for a long time she had tried to think that herself, but when faced with the accusation from Jack, she realized how untrue it was. For the first time she was acknowledging to herself how torn she'd felt to know that he was leaving on the raft, how stricken she'd been to see him return barely clinging to life, how powerful was the relief that swept over her when she knew he was going to pull through. And for the first time she was admitting to herself that it all meant something. It meant everything.

And it was time to stop running.

------

"Is that you, Freckles?" Sawyer said to the silhouette standing at the entrance of his tent, sitting up in his sleeping bag.

"Yeah," she said, allowing herself to enter, "it's me. Were you expecting someone else?"

Sawyer laughed a little. "You never can tell around here," he said, lying back down and crossing his good arm behind his head, apparently willing to look over their tense argument of that morning, at least for the time being.

"Good point," she said, smiling a little, throwing down her back pack and bending to pull off her boots.

"Well make yourself at home," he said a bit mockingly at her actions, but his voice was teasing, not angry.

"You said I could come back when I was ready for the truth," she said, looking at him seriously.

"Yeah," he nodded, studying her face expectantly. "Gotta say though, I didn't expect you'd be back this soon."

"Me neither," she said with an ironic smile. "But you were right, Sawyer." She took off the button-up she was wearing over a tank and settled into the sleeping bag beside him, laying her head on his smooth bare chest.

"Right about what?" he asked, a little breathless with expectancy.

"It's not just lust."

There was a long moment in which neither of them said anything, simply lying there with the rise and fall of his chest and the slow sounds of jungle insects outside the tent. "Is that all?" he said finally, his voice quiet and hopeful.

"For now," she said quietly. "But it's a start, right?"

He smiled and removed his arm from behind his head, curling it around her body. "Yeah," he said. "It's a start."

They sat in silence for another long stretch, listening to each other's breathing. Then Kate spoke. "Hurley told Jack he saw me coming out of here this morning," she said. "He asked me if we're having sex."

"Well, whaddaya know," said Sawyer. "I didn't think it was physically possible, but looks like Hurley's mouth's bigger than his ass."

Kate laughed. "You're mean," she said, but her voice was teasing.

"You're the one laughing, Peaches," he pointed out.

"Okay, so I'm mean, too," she said, chuckling, then added, "He's jealous of you, you know. Jack, I mean."

"Yeah?" Sawyer said. "Who isn't?"

She laughed again and he smiled, relishing in the clear, cool sound of it. "I'm not jealous of you," she said slyly.

"Of course you ain't, Freckles," he said, a bit jokingly but with sincerity in his voice. "That's cause you and me's equals."

She smiled softly to herself. "Yeah," she said. "Equals." The word was so quiet that he could barely make it out, as if she said it only to herself, testing the way it felt on her lips.

He spoke again after a few long moments. "Don't know what Jack's got to be upset about," he said speculatively. "Looks like Ana-Lucia's keeping him pretty occupied." He contemplated this for another moment and said, "Sometimes I really wonder which one of us is manlier."

"Who?" asked Kate, intrigued. "You and Jack?"

"Fuck no," said Sawyer, laughing. "Ain't no question about _that. _I was talking 'bout me and Ana-Lucia."

And their laughter rang out into the clear warm night, wrapping around them and filling the tent with its sound.


	4. Chapter 4

"Hey, Freckles?" asked Sawyer upon waking the next morning. "I've got a little favor to ask of you."

"I already did you a favor," she said, smiling as she pulled his mended shirt out of her back pack. "I fixed your shirt."

He took it from her proffered hand and examined it in genuine surprise. Slowly a smile came over his face. "You've been going through my stuff?" he teased her. "Stealing my _shirts_? What kind of a pervert are you?"

"Don't mock me!" she laughed, slapping at his arm lightly.

"Don't mock me!" he said in a high-pitched voice, to which she rolled her eyes but continued to smile.

"You're such a teenager," she chided him.

"Oh, so I've progressed!" he grinned. "Last week I was in junior high. What grade am I in now, about 10th, you reckon?"

"On a good day," she said, glowing with her smile.

He held up the mended shirt. "Thank you," he said sincerely, his voice quiet. She could tell that he was touched, despite his teasing.

"You're welcome," she said quietly, almost blushing and wondering what had inspired her to do such a favor unasked. "Now what were you going to ask me?"

"Ah, that," he said, placing the shirt aside. "Well, you see, my physical therapy's going along kind of slow and I'm begin to suspect that my trainer isn't fully certified." Kate gasped in mock offense, but he held up a finger to stop her from protesting. "Now, now, that's not the point," he continued. "The thing is, I still can't lift this arm here above my head," with a gesture to his injured shoulder.

"Yeah?" she said. "And?"

"And it's damn hard to work up a good lather with only one hand." He grinned and gestured to his dirty hair.

"You want me to wash your hair," she said, more of a comment than a question. She placed her hands on her hips and looked at him with a small amused smile.

"Hell, you're already my barber, ain't you?" he asked. "Might as well do the complete job, Freckles."

Kate laughed. "So now I'm your nurse, your physical therapist, _and_ your barber," she said, ticking off the titles on her fingers. She sighed and in a teasing question said, "What would you do without me?"

"Go crazy," he said, smiling faintly and with a tone of half-seriousness in his voice.

She paused as if in contemplation for a moment, then looked at him skeptically. "So what do I get out of this?"

"The pleasure of my company?" he offered.

She laughed. "Uh uh," she said, shaking her head. "I want something... tangible."

"Well I've got a lot to offer," he said silkily. "Was there something in particular you had in mind?" His eyes were sparkling with the thinly veiled innuendo.

Kate pretended to ponder this for a moment before saying with a saucy smirk, "A kiss ought to do it."

Sawyer stood and came over to where she was standing. His eyes were serious and intense. "Baby," he said quietly. "You don't gotta bargain for one of those." And he leaned in to take her lips in a kiss.

But Kate turned her cheek to him and laughed. "Not yet," she teased. "I haven't earned it."

"Oh-ho," he chuckled. "So we're playing, are we?"

She grinned at him. "Always."

-------------

Kate held Sawyer's head in a small plastic bin on her lap, wetting his hair with a bottle of water and squirting a dab of shampoo into her palm. "You ready?" she asked.

"Mmm hmm," he hummed, his eyes closed and a smile on his lips.

He moaned lightly as she began working her fingers through his hair, massaging his scalp firmly. "You have no idea how good that feels," he purred, peeking his eyes open for a moment to examine her face from his upside-down position.

Kate rolled her eyes a little. "You sound like you're having an orgasm," she said, laughing at him as he continued to make small sounds of approval.

"Maybe I am," she said saucily, his eyes dancing.

Kate smiled, feeling her cheeks warm with his remark, but he had closed his eyes again, and she continued for several minutes with her lathering. "You're so dirty," she remarked, noting how grimy the water in the bin had become.

Sawyer smiled, eyes still closed. "You have _no idea._"

"Oh, I don't know," she retorted, feeling brave. "I've got a pretty good imagination." She picked up the water bottle and dumped it over his head, rinsing out the suds.

"Hmm, I like the sound of that," he cooed. "Tell me, Freckles... what've you been dreaming up?"

She bent down closer to him and said in a conspiring whisper, "Maybe I'll tell you later... if you're good."

"You _know _I'm good, baby," he said, sitting up and running his hands through his now clean hair. "Now you ready for that kiss or what?" He was smiling at her expectantly, and she reached for him with the towel she had nearby, moving in close to towel off his hair.

But she shook her head. "Not yet," she said. "We're not done."

"We're not?" he asked, confused.

"Nope," she said, pulling a straight-edged razor from her bag and showing it to him.

"Woah-ho-ho," he said, backing away a little. "What's that for?"

"What do you think, doofus?" she teased. "You need a _shave_. You're starting to look like some kind of convict."

"Takes one to know one," he teased, an acknowledgment of their shared criminal pasts, and she smiled, untroubled by the reference coming from him, knowing he did not sit in judgment of her.

"Do you trust me?" she asked, a sincere question.

He nodded slowly and moved to put his head back in her lap. "Yeah," he said quietly. "I trust you."

"Good," she said quietly, hoping to herself that their trust in each other would not break like Jack had said it would. "Just hold still."

Cradling his head in her lap, Kate slathered his face with shaving cream. Carefully, she began moving the razor across his cheeks in smooth, controlled strokes, periodically rinsing the razor and moving in again for another steady swipe. Done with his cheeks, she instructed him to stand to better shave his chin and neck, and he watched her from the corners of his eyes with a small smile on his face as she circled him looking for the best angles, her face screwed up in concentration and her tongue between her teeth as she tried valiantly not to nick him.

"There," she said triumphantly, when her task was finally complete, wiping his face with the damp towel she'd used to dry his hair. She was looking at his mouth and smiling like a cat in the cream.

"What?" he asked, feeling slightly self-conscious at her stare.

"I can see them again," she said, meeting his eyes, her own eyes veritably dancing with happiness.

"See what?" he asked, confused.

"Your dimples." Her voice was affectionate, her smile broad and glowing, and she moved in closer to him so that her body was flush against his.

"Aww, shucks," he said in feigned modesty, rubbing his cheeks. "These old things?"

And then she was kissing him, lips soft, wet, insistent. She was holding his freshly shaved cheeks, feeling the baby-soft smoothness of the tender skin, and after several moments he pulled her down to the ground, holding her on top of him, tumbling in the sand with her.

Finally they broke away from each other for a moment, all grins and giggles. "I thought you said _a _kiss, Freckles."

"Are you complaining?"

"Not for one second," he said, pulling her to him again and parting her lips with his tongue.

Panting, he pulled away after a long moment and looked up at her. "So when you gonna tell me all about this colorful imagination of yours?" he asked. "I've been a good boy, haven't I? I held still and everything, just like you said."

Kate was smiling impishly, and she moved her lips close to his ear to whisper. "I _could _tell you," she said, "_or... _I could just _show _you."

"Mmm," he purred, moving his hand down to her ass as she placed light kisses on his neck. "Show _and _tell. How 'bout that, Peaches?"

"Hmm, I don't know," she said with a smile. "Isn't a 10th grader a little old for show-and-tell?"

And they smiled as their lips came together once more.


End file.
